Elemental Nausea

Guest

So what I know about the moeller technique: this technique comes from a guy called moeller who stole this technique from guys in the army who used it to make accent on their snare drums which they carrey around while marching.
It is a kind of whip movement in which you first raise your elbow and then just let it drop.
I mean it`s not such a complicated technique, everyone has to use it for playing, for example,
silent tabs or rolls on the snare and then making accents with your right or left hand.
you first have to start practicing very slowly and really make a big movement with your elbow, so that you get into the technique...the faster you play the smaller should the movement become... a good dvd for moeller technique demonstration would e.g. be dave weckel`s "A Natural Evolution"

Member

hi guy
i use the moeller technique and i know how it works,
the principal about this is hold the sticks if you played matched with your middle finger and your thumb, the rest of your fingers keep relaxed, if you play traditional grip you have to know that the pressure is in your thumb and is a very light pressure.
The science in this technique is to use your arm and wrist for slow movements and exagerate the move, when you make faster moves you have to use only your wrist, and fingers, i dont any use my fingers at all, just wrist, cause i use so much the rebound and that allows me to use less energy.
natural evolution is far away the best dvd about that or you can purchase the jim chapin book advanced technique for the modern drummer. If you have some request write me at talento_innato1@hotmail.com

Pioneer Member

The Steve Smith video Drumset technique and history of the u.s. beat is another good video that shows how to do it really well. I found the double dvd online for something like $34.99 my local sam ash and guitar center wanted $60. It's a great video! Shows other really cool grooves and approaches to playing that are really worth the money!
I'm working on developing that technique, it takes time and practice. Time is the one thing that seems to be lacking lately. Oh well practice when you can.

Junior Member

Hey Bashkin. I started pursuing an answer to those questions myself fairly recently, so I'm happy for the discussion opportunity. As a starting point, you might check out Vic Firth's "cyberlesson" by Dom Femularo featuring Jim Chapin (http://www.vicfirth.com/education/drumset/domfamularo.html). Chapin was a student of Sam Moeller in the late thirties and is regarded now as the primary exponent of Moeller's methods. Chapin has a book called "advanced techniques for the modern drummer" in which he presents exercises for the development of the technique.

I believe this is the same technique that's also been called "idle hand high" (and fellow readers please correct me if I'm wrong) and was used by rudimental drummers even before Moeller's time. The basic gist is that your arm is actually made up of a series of levers wtihin levers, functioning with some independence. For instance, if your forearm rises and falls on the quarter note pulse, your wrist (as the smaller lever) can play the eighth note divisions between the quarters. This is a technique that most modern drummers often use intuitively for ride and hihat work. Basically, it's a matter of dividing up the notes according to relative dynamic level and allowing larger (slower) muscles like your arms to handle the louder notes, while your wrists and finally your fingers play progressively faster and quieter notes in between. That said, they're obviously not totally independent, and so the "trick" of the technique is in maintaining control and coordination throughout this stroke.

I've found that a good exercise to work on my control across the various sound levels of this stroke is to play hand-to-hand sixteenths while accenting every other stroke (R l r L R l r L). I play this at different tempos and increase until I can no longer maintain solid contact with the stick throughout the stroke. Paradiddles and any other diddle rudiments are also great for getting the fingers involved. If you're mainly a set player, you may find that your lead hand already knows exactly what to do, in which case you can bring the weaker hand along by studying the movements of the stronger hand. Anyhow, hope this helps a bit. Happy drumming.

Pioneer Member

Well you could search in Sam Goody. They generally have a lot of technique books, but if you want my opinion I'd invest the time and money to find a teacher to help you. Moeller technique is far from easy and it helps to be able to see it first-hand.

Pioneer Member

Well you could search in Sam Goody. They generally have a lot of technique books, but if you want my opinion I'd invest the time and money to find a teacher to help you. Moeller technique is far from easy and it helps to be able to see it first-hand.

Member

I studied it from the Dave Weckl video and the Steve Smith DVD and never really got it checked for form so im no authority on this, but...

Its the technique that... well you have play a stoke, but then after your main stroke, the rebound will allow you to have more strokes that are unaccented. Dave Weckl says this is not upstroke down stroke but i guess i didnt know what that was in the first place. Well anyway you move your arm in a way that you can milk the most amound of clean rebounds from your initial stroke. If you are playing traditional grip, which I do, youre hand will curl up towards the right side of the drum as you rewind for your next grip... I practice this with triplets so my arm is all the way down on the left when i get the first stroke, and I wind up towards the center area of the drum getting two more stroke. WIth the right hand it goes outwards getting three hits out of one stroke.

Its hard to explain, but the Dave weckl DVD does a pretty good job teaching it... but its really breif so I was bummed when I got it... but you will understand it. I think it was easier to understand than how Steve Smith was explaining it.

Pioneer Member

I studied it from the Dave Weckl video and the Steve Smith DVD and never really got it checked for form so im no authority on this, but...

Its the technique that... well you have play a stoke, but then after your main stroke, the rebound will allow you to have more strokes that are unaccented. Dave Weckl says this is not upstroke down stroke but i guess i didnt know what that was in the first place. Well anyway you move your arm in a way that you can milk the most amound of clean rebounds from your initial stroke. If you are playing traditional grip, which I do, youre hand will curl up towards the right side of the drum as you rewind for your next grip... I practice this with triplets so my arm is all the way down on the left when i get the first stroke, and I wind up towards the center area of the drum getting two more stroke. WIth the right hand it goes outwards getting three hits out of one stroke.

Its hard to explain, but the Dave weckl DVD does a pretty good job teaching it... but its really breif so I was bummed when I got it... but you will understand it. I think it was easier to understand than how Steve Smith was explaining it.

GONE MUCH TOO EARLY!!!

To rudimental drummer....
Its the technique that... well you have play a stoke, but then after your main stroke, the rebound will allow you to have more strokes that are unaccented. Dave Weckl says this is not upstroke down stroke but i guess i didnt know what that was in the first place. Well anyway you move your arm in a way that you can milk the most amound of clean rebounds from your initial stroke. If you are playing traditional grip, which I do, youre hand will curl up towards the right side of the drum as you rewind for your next grip... I practice this with triplets so my arm is all the way down on the left when i get the first stroke, and I wind up towards the center area of the drum getting two more stroke. WIth the right hand it goes outwards getting three hits out of one stroke.

I think the main thing to realise is that when people talk about Moeller Technique they're often talking about two different things.

1) "Proper" moeller technique as described above - it's not really an accented pattern, more a way of using the "moeller motion" to give a relaxed series of notes at the same dynamic from one hand.
2) Moeller technique as applied to accents, where strokes are played as upstrokes, downstrokes etc but the up and down strokes are achieved using a combination of wrist and forearm movement.

They both use the same key motions - a snap of the wrist combined with a lift of the arm, like a whiplash movement. They just do different things with them. #1 is good for playing a series of notes at a single dynamic, fast, with one hand. #2 is probably more practically useful during everyday grooving in that you can use it to execute accented hi-hat lines and pull accents patterns out of stickings around the kit.

If you're after a video of the second approach, I posted a link to a page on my site with some video in another thread (called something like "Playing fast"). It might be useful in understanding the movement, and you can maybe use that to work out how you'd apply it to #1.

hypecast

Guest

Before going any further, let me say I'm no expert, nor am I taking sides with anyone, I'm just reporting what I've seen/read, and my experience with this mystical technique .

FWIW, I became interested a while back, after a friend saw a Dave Weckl clinic around the time Weckl had 'converted' to it and was singing its praises. So... I went to a Weckl clinic, was blown away, blah, blah, blah, and faithfully started practicing the technique as he demonstrated it. I couldn't wait to learn it, thinking then I'd surely be the next Dave Weckl, which isn't even something I aspire to, but I figured at least I could use chops like that for my own evil purposes. I could never completely get the hang of it, so I bought the book. Funny thing, I discovered Weckl hadn't demonstrated it how Moeller himself describes it (and the blurb about the book at that site even mentions how many instructors get it wrong).

Anyway, still in my Moeller phase, I then heard that Jim Chapin was *really* the guy who could teach it (he actually studied with Moeller), so I got Chapin's video (which is really good). Hiyever, Chapin himself admits even he doesn't use the technique *exactly* as Moeller taught it, because it's derived from a technique Army drummers were using on marching snares way back in the 1800s, and that's what the technique is ideal for: rudimental drumming on old-school, slanted marching snares. For things like buzz rolls, single-stroke rolls and other things, there are better techniques, IMO (and Chapin's too, if you listen closely). If nothing else, though, it got me to where I could play paradiddles at like 900 mph.

Bottom line: I think the Moeller technique is a great *addition* to my tool kit, and the book and video really helped my playing. Once I got it through my head not to try to rely solely on it, it became useful, as I could pick and choose where it's most valuable to me. Hate to make the analogy, but it's like martial arts: no one style is necessarily superior to any other, they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Bruce Lee (how am I mentioning Bruce Lee on a drummer's forum?) was of the opinion that it was wise to study them all and take the best from each, leave the worst. It's also my opinion (and just that, an opinion) that drumming is the same way (well, most things in life, really, but now I surely digress).

One last thought: through links on this forum, I've recently discovered the Gladstone technique, and am quite fascinated by it. I'd like to find some way to study it and see how incorporating it would help my playing. I also now realize, after watching some video clips on the technique, that what Weckl demonstrated way back at that clinic was at least as close to the Gladstone technique as it was to Moeller's, really a hybrid of the two. What he was doing now makes more sense to me. It seems (and I'm probably wrong) that he settled on a technique that incorporates elements of both. Even if he didn't, I don't think it's a bad idea.

GONE MUCH TOO EARLY!!!

Hate to make the analogy, but it's like martial arts: no one style is necessarily superior to any other, they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Bruce Lee (how am I mentioning Bruce Lee on a drummer's forum?) was of the opinion that it was wise to study them all and take the best from each, leave the worst. It's also my opinion (and just that, an opinion) that drumming is the same way (well, most things in life, really, but now I surely digress).

I agree. The more you learn, the more you can figure out what's appropriate where. I currently have a problem in that I can play french grip (thumbs on top) in my right hand quite well due to using it for jazz ride cymbal playing, yet can't do it with the left. That's not particularly ideal, since I have found that there are times when it is very appropriate and I would like to be able to move both hands to the same grip to execute certain ideas.

Likewise heel down vs heel up bass drum playing - I can do both, and neither is downright better. They both have situations where they're clearly the better option. The hard bit is switching between them on the fly. Learning more techniques can only make you a stronger player.

That said, it's not a good idea to study too many at once IHMO. It's easy to reach into the "toolbox" and grab a technique you've already learned, but beginning heaps of similar but different techniques at the same time is quite confusing and for me tends to slow down my learning of any of them to a stage where I can switch to it quickly.

Junior Member

look, I was googling on the web and found this topic about moeller technique in your forum, so I would like to share with you (and to hear from you about it) one message I have posted in another drum forum, that seems to me, would be a nice contribuition to continue this subject wich I find of great importance for drummers. so, here it is:

I wasnt able to get in moeller´s method yet right in the source (like a book or an article from him or something), but according to the information I could collect untill now, moeller´s prestige on drumming scene through 1930 to about 1960 is due to the uncommon style of his drumlines, wich were based on very wide wavy motions, really unique among the style of the other drumlines of that time.

my experience as a teacher and observer of other teachers and musicians has pointed me that most people tend to mistake that kind of motion with fluidity of movements and technical facility, and this is one of the most important factors that lead those people to frustration when trying to play their best.

if you pay attention, all the great musicians that are claimed to use the "moeller technique", when playing virtuosistyc frases will drastically reduce the amplitude of their motions, concentrating only on controling the accents to produce even and soft taps, and so, detaching the melodic quality of their grooves, licks and solos (witch is the final purpose for general drumming)

for me, in order to achieve complete control of drumming technique it is necessary to watch out for excellent posture (body/arms and grip) and full domain of the down up tap full technique.

I really dont know if moeller himself gave birth to this concept. I just remember I saw it for the first time in Gene Krupa´s book (who was a student of moeller), then on "patterns" by gary chafee and a book from john wooton (the drummer´s rudimental refference book) in witch he quotes gary chafee method when talking about this technique.

I think that more important than round a circle through our movemets
is to achieve a nice quality of ciclic motion (ok, the best way to do a cicle is through a circle...), and the down up tecnique is a true way to go for it.

here in Brasil, from our most famous traveled drummers we hear a lot about "circular", but nothing about "cicles"...what do you think about that?